Armed success story by new member

This is a discussion on Armed success story by new member within the In the News: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly forums, part of the The Back Porch category; Hey everyone,
During the process of researching CCW info my son ran across this forum and joined, and sent me the link and I joined ...

Armed success story by new member

Hey everyone,
During the process of researching CCW info my son ran across this forum and joined, and sent me the link and I joined recently also. It looks like a good group with good discussions.
About 10 years ago I had an unexpected incident requiring my son and I to arm ourselves to protect our home and community. The story is entirely accurate (still embedded in my brain)and has a successful conclusion. I have no intentions whatsoever of conveying this story as a boast or bragging venue, but I thought it might be interesting and perhaps informative to share it with you from our first-hand experience. I'd be happy to write this story in detail, though it could be lengthy. How much writing capacity do I have in one initial post, or would it be better to split the story up. Splitting it up over a couple of days or so would be easier on me.

A man fires a rifle for many years, and he goes to war. And afterward he turns the rifle in at the armory, and he believes he's finished with the rifle. But no matter what else he might do with his hands - love a woman, build a house, change his son's diaper - his hands remember the rifle.

Thanks for the welcomes. I'll split this story in a few daily segments, so this first segment begins with a little background info.

I'm a farmer and live with my family in rural Louisiana. Our home is located on some of our farm property. One summer about ten years ago, my son and I were working on a tractor outside when I noticed an unmarked deputy car going from neighbor to neighbors house. I didn't think much about it and thought he was looking for someone to serve papers. Eventually he came over to us (I knew the deputy) and actually he was warning everyone locally that two bad guys were loose in our area. He quickly gave us a brief description of them, and mentioned they were in a stolen car and a possible abduction of a female had taken place. He didn't know what else they may have done, info at this time was pretty sketchy, but they definitely didn't want to be caught.

Apparently they were in a Mustang the police had pulled over in town for some traffic violation, and they decided to take off and evade the police. The policeman chased them nearly twenty miles out-of-town, and by coincidence they came down the state hwy we live on. At the time the hwy had a spot with some bumps and dips that caused them to lose control of their stolen Mustang and skidded off in the ditch. With the policeman right behind them, the two suspects jumped out and headed in the woods, leaving the abducted female in the Mustang. Although all of this occurred nearby where we were working, we couldn't see the wreck area due to the terrain, or hear any sirens since we had a noisy tractor motor running at the time.

There are plenty of thick woods and bottoms nearby so I knew the bad guys had a pretty good hide and evade advantage. Luckily for us, the bad guys entered the woods on the west side of the hwy, our house is on the east side, about a quarter mile from where they wrecked, so it seemed they headed away from our house. No one was home at our house, though we don't lock it often since we're nearby. After the deputy left I told my son that we'd better go and immediately check and secure our house to be on the safe side.

In my farm truck I carry an old inexpensive 12 gauge riot gun. I like the magazine capacity and the handiness of the short (legal) barrel. It's primary use heretofore has been for the various snakes, varmints and whatever else comes up. Today was turning into a "whatever else comes up" day.

On our drive back to our house my son and I made a quick plan. We felt confident that our house had not been inhabited by unwanted guests, however we needed to check, so I would get out of the truck quickly with the riot gun and search our house. My son would turn the truck around headed out and wait on me from a distance. If he heard anything unusual he would leave and go get the nearby deputies.

As I approached my house door, it's amazing how refined your senses become. I was sure that as soon as I opened the door my nose would tell me if two sweaty guys were in my house.

Good question. The deputy was in a hurry to leave to help contain the area they felt the bad guys were in. They were also very short-handed at the time though help was on the way. This is a rural area and due to distance it can take a while for more help to arrive. Extra manpower at that time for them to search my house, really wasn't available. Also we wanted to check it out as fast as possible and if they were there, not allow them additional time to find items (car keys, knives, phone, etc) that might aid their escape.

The area the guys ran into was dense woods (away from my house), on the other side of the hwy. Where we live the area is more open and populated, not a likely place for them to run and hide. The city policeman that chased them saw where they went and never saw them cross back over the hwy towards my home.

My home was not a priority or suspected as being possibly occupied by them. However we were not 100% sure that they didn't double back, and though low risk, we didn't want to leave any stone unturned. Had I approached my house and detected something amiss, I would have backed out, monitored my house, and got additional help.